A Few Months in Austin
by Mrs Dionysius O'Gall
Summary: "I looked at the night sky for the longest time, trying to make sense of a universe where solar systems explode and young women die just because someone wants someone else's money." A few years following the death of Agent Vega, Patrick Jane reflects. Takes place during and after 7x10.


For a few months in Austin, I unexpectedly experienced what being a father to an older Charlotte might have been like.

I, Patrick Jane, got the chance to act like someone's father again.

That day when Agent Vega-Michelle-asked me about her father, was one of the best non-Lisbon-related days of my time at the FBI. It was the day I discovered that a fatherless young woman could learn something from me, that I had something to offer her. Something I might have shared with my Charlotte. For a few months in Austin, I discovered something about myself: I would have really enjoyed being a dad to an older Charlotte.

Oh, Charlotte. I have rooms dedicated to you in my memory palace.

Until the day that Angela's pregnancy was confirmed, I was positive that the most wonderful day of my life was the day that Angela looked me in the eyes as we made love for the first time. I was convinced that something so wonderful would never happen to me again.

Then I became a father.

Being Charlotte's father, for all its joys, wasn't easy-it had its difficulties. I became a father without the support of a family and whatever friends we had. When I found out about Charlotte, I did not have a mother who might burst into tears, saying, "About time! I had almost given up hope!" And my father-well he was never the type to clap me on the back, congratulating me with a wink. I'd already been robbed of that moment when a father finds out that his own son is embarking on that same journey, before I was even grown up. Robbed by my own father and his avarice.

But I learned to be a good father. And six short years later, Red John took all that away.

After that, I never imagined I would have joy in my life again. My plan was simple: get Red John, make him pay, and hopefully, take myself out as well. But then I met the one and only Agent Teresa Lisbon of the CBI. Slowly, over a dozen years, Agent Lisbon became my Teresa. I began to hope again, in spite of myself. And after Red John, in her own way, by leaving Washington, then by leaving Pike, she brought me into what became our FBI family.

When I returned from the island, I realized I had missed being part of a family. Luckily, our FBI team coalesced fairly quickly.

There was Teresa, my friend, lover, partner, moral compass, and so much more. For so many years, she only had the pain of my obsession. And then, in Austin, our FBI family exploded into our lives, and the happiness I felt with Teresa multiplied. Though I wasn't the man who made plans, I sometimes dreamed.

I'd always been good at reading Lisbon, but Teresa was so much harder. After we visited her family and she actually said the words "I love you", I dreamed that maybe I could be a real father again, and it would start somewhat like this:

She'd be moaning, saying she was a failure, couldn't get the kid out, wanted to give up.

I'd stroke her hair, and gently rub her arm. I'd say. "You are not failing."

Teresa would answer with something like "I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do."

I'd tell her "It's okay. You're not going to fail. You can do this."

I'd offer to hypnotize her and she would slap me-after first lecturing me about the legality.

And then I'd wake up.

At work, I was often sought out by our new, young Agent Michelle Vega, asking the curiosity-fueled questions a mentee asks of her mentor. I eventually shared some of my tricks with her...for a few months in Austin.

I remember when Abbott told us she was in the hospital. I was with Teresa; we frantically drove to the hospital.

When we got there, Cho was of course at her side, but the absence of hospital people in white coats told me all I needed to know.

Later, I asked Cho if he'd been there at the moment she died. "No," he said. Cho told me that they were unable to save her on the table, and had transferred her to a room after closing her up. The room was silent, so silent. Cho said he began panicking, thinking, 'Why isn't Michelle talking? She talks non-stop. She's been shot. She should be yelling, she's in pain...'

If you knew Kimball Cho, you d know that this unveiling of his emotions was excruciating for him. I don't think he would have revealed himself to Lisbon.

There we stood, Teresa and I, looking at Michelle's serene, dead body, the room so silent. Teresa's hand lay flat against my back. I waited, then turned and stoically walked out into the corridor, and waited for a very long time, and finally heard Teresa moan "Oh Kimball!" My Teresa, she was there for him. She's always there for her team.

I went back in, still stunned and disbelieving that all of this, any of this, was happening. I touched her shoulder, Michelle's shoulder. She was just a shell.

As was Kimball Cho.

Agent Michelle Vega had no immediate family, just an aunt and cousins. Abbott asked Lisbon to help write the funeral program. Vega's aunt opted for a military funeral, so "all" Abbott had to do was pick out a casket at the aunt's request. I don't know how he could do it: for me, this would be an unbearable horror.

Later, Kimball Cho told me more about his horror as he accompanied her in the ambulance.

Cho said he talked to her, about how much everyone appreciated her prowess as an agent, her enthusiasm, her curiosity. He told her that the FBI would take good care of her memory forever and how we would always remember her.

And that was the end of Agent Michelle Vega's short life.

I'd only known her for a few months in Austin. I don't want to just know my Teresa as the love of the rest of my life for a few months or years. I want us to die in each other's arms, after we've grown beyond old and decrepit.

When I married Angela, I expected a lifetime. I didn't get but a fraction. I want that lifetime now, for my second chance.

* * *

Then came the funeral.

Michelle's funeral was three days after her death. The service was excruciatingly painful. Lisbon was stoic, in that way cops and soldiers are.

I couldn't bring myself to shovel dirt on Michelle's casket. I stood aside, holding myself up, until I'd seen Lisbon safely fulfill her role.

When I went off to the side to think about what had happened, what COULD very easily happen to Teresa, she sought me out. I gently explained why I had to leave, then turned and left. Teresa still believed in her training, in her previous success rate, to keep her safe.

I knew better.

Seven steps. It only took her only seven steps to catch up with me, to grab my arm.

I stopped; I swear buckets of sweat must have rolled off me in relief. She came after me!

"Patrick, are you sure?" Teresa asked.

"About leaving?"

"No, about me coming with you," she clarified, her beautiful face etched by channels of tears.

"I'm sure," I answered, and in her eyes, I saw that the trust we shared carried over in understanding and acceptance.

I felt there might be hope now. That she might be listening to me, not just hearing me. Because every time I saw her in danger, I felt exactly as if someone had placed a gun against my head and pulled the trigger. I imagined my brain hurtling backwards behind me.

Teresa squared her shoulders, and took both my hands.

She then took me in her arms, whispering to me. After a while, I looked over her shoulder and saw the law enforcement crowd oblivious to us, to this sacred moment when I finally felt she understood my fear, in our grief for Michelle.

And then she slapped me.

"How dare you? How dare you?" she hissed, eyes blazing indignantly.

Her fists balled, she pounded my chest in frustration. I gently restrained her by the wrists.

"How dare you say that your death wouldn't hurt you? It would destroy me! Destroy me!"

She looked me in the eyes and I think I started to understand.

* * *

I remember another time at another cemetery. Two beautiful coffins, one large, one small.

On that day, I had no one, no one to meet my eyes. For over a decade, I asked myself: "why did they have to die?" And I knew the answer. It was my hubris.

* * *

Later that night, after we'd finally begun listening to each other, we took the Airstream into the nearby Hill Country. Outside, I stared into a night of stars and sadness. I looked at the night sky for the longest time, trying to make sense of a universe where solar systems explode and young women die just because someone wants someone else's money. A world where a six-year-old girl is taken from her daddy. A world where a mother is killed along with her child, leaving a broken man behind. A world where death leaves us shattered and alone.

I don't remember much of anything else of that night in the Hill Country, except for Teresa's hand over mine. Always there for me.

The next morning, I awoke in our small bed and had perhaps a small amount of hope-tiny, tiny. Maybe it was the lack of sleep. Maybe it was because Teresa held things together. I reached for Teresa. I was so stiff and sore, it took me over a minute to sit up; she waited and then took both my hands.

"We can work this out," she said.

* * *

At the FBI, when we returned, I mostly remember the silence during the first few days; no one seemed to know what to say. The silence shook me: it was unimaginable that a bullpen so full of Agent Vega's incessant curiosity could now be so silent.

The first days back were an utterly excruciating experience. Of course, everyone in the building knew about Vega. Working, particularly working in the same place we had with Michelle, was unspeakable, terrible. So, sometimes I would just walk out. Teresa understood. I had to get away. I'd walk around the building. Walk and walk. And when we went out in the field, it was worse still: incoming missiles of pain around every corner. Lisbon was right, there was always another train.

I think of all that Teresa did for me. It's always with me. How she loved me, continues to love me. How she loved me enough to overcome her reluctance to leave her dangerous job. I think a lot about her hands; her shoulders and arms extended to me. I think a lot about her kindness. I think a lot about her love: how it has its own energy, its own sense, its own power, and how it can be felt and touched and heard, just like a pulse, just like time. Except it doesn't end; instead it streams, ripples, and runs its own current. I think I wasn't ready until Teresa for that current to envelop me.

I think a lot about our FBI family. They all reacted in different ways, and were deeply moved by Michelle's death. Dennis, of course, already had Lena, and seemed to react better than most. Young Jason Wylie was affected-survivor's guilt, in a way-he was the one agent rarely in the line of fire. Cho, Wylie later confided to Lisbon, ended up seeing a therapist after having a very bad year.

Over the years, I'd left Teresa more than once, and I knew it was her greatest fear-being abandoned. After Michelle's death, we both learned that indeed, we were strong together, and that I did not need to be alone in my pain and fear. That she could ask for things for me.

When Angela and Charlotte were buried, Angela's family chose a beautiful site, lots of trees and birds. Michelle's is much the same.

It doesn't matter to me.

Teresa believes that the dead live on in spirit. The few times I have been to my girls' graves, I have not felt anything. My Angela does not rise above her grave to play with our Charlotte at night. Teresa once told me that she likes to think that Michelle is with her parents and that Michelle watches over Cho and Wylie. Teresa also likes to think that Charlotte, too, knows about love. That she knows she has two moms: Angela, and her, the mother of Charlotte's sibling. And she believes that Angela and Charlotte watch over our child.

I respect her beliefs, as long as they bring her solace.

* * *

My wallet has four special things in it. One is the note I wrote to Lisbon for my birthday, when I really had no idea what my gift would be. Then there's Charlotte's last school picture, and a picture of me, Angela and Charlotte when Charlotte graduated from kindergarten. Finally, a photo of me and Teresa from the CBI days.

The photos of Teresa and our child-I keep those on my phone.

* * *

A while ago, Teresa received an email from Lena Abbott. After a change of administration, she was on to new pursuits, and the Abbotts had returned to Texas.

Dear Teresa and Patrick,  
Well, Dennis and I went to see Agent Vega's grave today. I was touched by how lovely her gravesite is.

We got lost but I think it was mostly because Dennis was overwhelmed when he drove in. He says he was numb and can't remember much from Agent Vega's funeral, so it's understandable that he'd lose his way.

I went into the office; they pointed me in the right direction.

It was sunny and very warm today. All the flowers were beautiful; there were some birds hovering, and that gave the place a bit of life among all the quiet. I brought a dozen baby yellow roses and a little note. I want Agent Vega to know that the boss's wife, whose job she helped save, remembers her.

Dennis thinks I didn't see, but he cried.

A caretaker came up and asked if Agent Vega was our relative and I said, "No, not directly, but she was part of my husband's family in her own way."

We walked around a bit; Agent Vega wasn't the first on-the-job loss Dennis had experienced.

Teresa and Patrick, you are very much in our thoughts. We owe you and your old team my husband's freedom.

I know that Agent Vega touched all of you, not just for a few months during that time in Austin, but for always. Dennis is still searching for the sense of this, of what happened.

Send pictures of your beautiful child when you get a chance.

Fondly,  
Lena and Dennis

* * *

Yes, for a few months in Austin, I unexpectedly experienced what being a father to an older Charlotte might have been like.

I never thought I'd get to be a dad again, even want to open my heart to all the highs and lows. Mentoring Agent Michelle Vega, giving her the perspective of a father, helped me, more than it helped her, I think.

With time and compromise, Teresa and I were able to take that step. She became a mother. I became a father, again.

Who was I to deny her an experience that she so dearly wanted, I rationalized.

And we're joyously happy. Our lives are messy, especially our home these days. All because of the culmination of a few months in Austin.


End file.
